The Basics of Bible - Herald of Hope

The Sign of Global Apostacy
within Christendom
The Bible indicates that the last days will
be characterized by a massive departure
from the "faith which was once delivered to
the saints"(Jude 3).
The New Testament Church was built upon
the foundation of the doctrine of the
apostles and prophets (Eph.2:20-22). The
closing verses of the Bible warn that "If any
man shall add unto these things, God shall add
unto him the plagues that are written in this
book" (Rev.22:18-19), yet history has shown that there has been
departure (apostasy) from the doctrines taught by the apostles as
recorded inerrantly by Divine inspiration of the Scriptures.
The Roman Catholic Church has for many centuries forbidden the
reading of the Bible by the people, and its use of Latin until recent
times made much of church liturgy unintelligible to the masses.
The doctrines of Rome have both added to, and taken from the Word
of God. Doctrines such as purgatory, infant baptism, the confessional,
prayers for the dead, salvation by good works, the continual sacrifice
of the Mass, celibacy of the priests, prayers to the saints etc are pagan,
and cannot be found in Scripture.
However, it was not until December 1854 that Pope Pius IX declared
"the immaculate conception of the virgin Mary" to be a necessary
dogma of the (Catholic) faith. Since then the veneration of Mary has
grown, and today it is claimed she ascended to heaven and intercedes
for those who pray to her. Some in the Catholic Church are even
proposing that Mary be proclaimed co-Redemptrix with the Lord
Jesus Christ!
The Protestant Reformation (1517) stood against the teachings of
Rome and made the Bible available to the people. Many were liberated
from the apostate system, but as the centuries have passed the
Protestant denominations have embraced modernistic theology,
denying the verbal inspiration of the Word of God, and many essential
doctrines of the person of Christ and His substitutionary, sacrificial
work on our behalf.
The Lambeth Conference (1998), which brought together 735 bishops
of the Anglican Church worldwide, demonstrated how apostate
mainstream Protestantism has become, when it debated whether the
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Signs of the Last Days